After two years of intensive development, we’re finally ready to share the results of our project within the Swedish Post and Telecom Authority innovation competition 2023 “Communication for All.” The project has focused on exploring new ways to use sensor technology to make communication more accessible—especially for people with severe visual impairments or deafblindness, who often lack effective ways to send or receive digital information without relying on sight or hearing.
The result is xBand EMG, the world’s first wristband that makes it possible to send and receive information entirely without sight or hearing. The wristband uses vibrations and EMG (electromyography)—that is, reading muscle activity.
With xBand, you can receive everything from notifications and navigation instructions to text messages in the form of vibrations. Thanks to the EMG sensor, you can also issue commands and write text by simply contracting a muscle. This makes communication silent, discreet, and hands-free.
How does it work in practice?
What makes xBand EMG unique is its sensor that reads muscle activity. With it, you can, for example, send commands or write text through small, subtle movements such as tensing a finger. The technology captures the electrical signals from the muscle and translates them into commands in the wristband. This means you can communicate without buttons, screens, or sound—just by activating a muscle.
Working on this project together with users and user organizations has given us new perspectives on both technology and accessibility, and brought us closer to our vision of inclusive communication for everyone. For us, this is more than an assistive device—it’s a new sense for communication.
What’s next?
We plan to launch xBand EMG next year. At the same time, we’re continuing development towards even broader areas of use:
Smart homes and APIs – control lights, music, and other connected devices with a simple muscle movement.
New user groups – the technology can also support people with motor impairments, since an EMG sensor can be placed anywhere on the body, enabling text input even for those who cannot use traditional input devices.
We see strong interest in the idea of communicating through an entirely new sense. The need to interact without screens or sound is growing—in everyday life as well as in professional contexts. With xBand EMG, we want to open the door to a future where technology can be experienced and controlled in completely new ways.
Demo of the xBand EMG Prototype
In this video, the xBand EMG prototype is used to write Morse code through simple finger movements. By pressing the index finger and thumb together in patterns of short and long presses, the EMG sensor detects the muscle activity and translates it into Morse code. The code is then interpreted into text—in this demo, the word “Hej” (Swedish for Hello).